Wednesday, December 03, 2008

I have a young friend in South Africa whom I have known since he was a little boy. He is now permanently bemused to find himself one of that country's top cartoonists.

I subscribe to his feed for my daily dose of his particular brand of humour. I have often been tempted to link to one of his strips on this blog, but have realised that the humour is embedded in the South African-ness of the situation and may be completely meaningless to an external audience.

However, Jeremy recently brought a close to the most locally branded strip and replaced it with one with a broader appeal (and, as a sad but inevitable consequence, considerably less bite). He also has a single panel current affairs commentary type cartoon in one of the country's English language newspapers.

His two daily cartoon strips form the backbone of his blog, although he does also write other posts (in which he reveals that the little boy I used to know remains very near to the surface).

Like all good cartoonists, Jeremy is more than just a print version of a comedian. Today's cartoon from The Times makes reference to the declaration by the the deputy chair of the South African National Aids Council that "the war (on AIDS) is over".

3 comments:

@amandzing I make no claims about any war being over! If you have issue with any of the claims being made by either Jeremy Nell or Mark Heywood, I suggest you take that up with them.

I sincerely hope that the embarrassing denialism is over, however. For an ex-pat, there's nothing quite like being called upon to account for the indefensible stance taken by your home country's government, when all the while, your family and all the other millions of what you still call "my people" are being placed at risk!

perhaps i'm misunderstanding your post. as i understand it, the words in brackets ...that "the war (on AIDS) is over".... are your words?

again as i understand it, that bracketed section is factually incorrect, especialy when seen in the context of the original article...

Mark Heywood, deputy chair of the SA National Aids Council, said: “The war is over. This doesn’t mean that there won’t be disputes and that the Treatment Action Campaign will be muted when we have issues to raise — but it means that the level of resistance that we once encountered is over.

“Today is the day we start working and we are glad that this is a new beginning.”

Heywood, speaking in Durban at an event to commemorate the 20th anniversary of World Aids Day, was referring to the recent appointment of Barbara Hogan as health minister and the sea change she has brought to the government’s response to HIV-Aids.

About Me

I have been involved in learning and development (L&D) for 25 years. My primary focus is on workplace learning, but I have worked in a wide range of sectors including charities, sports bodies, education and government bodies. I find it very hard to draw boundaries, because learning is so much a part of everything in life.